The sun’s out and summer is round the corner - so what better time of year to open a new ice cream parlour?

Fans of Jack’s Gelato in Cambridge can now get their fix of the cold stuff every day of the week with the opening of the new shop in Bene’t Street.

Starting out street trading from its custom-built tricycle and at festivals, Jack’s Gelato is well known around the Cambridge area and is available at a number of the city’s eateries including Steak and Honour and Pint Shop.

Owner Jack van Praag opened his first shop on Saturday, employing new staff and has enjoyed a roaring trade so far.

His ice cream uses ingredients such as organic milk and cream, organic and fair trade cocoa along with organic and fair trade Madagascan vanilla, fruit, herbs and the occasional vegetable from his allotment and allotments of friends.

There are always about 12 flavours on offer out of a huge repertoire of about 200, which are made by hand in small batches and include imaginative flavours such as chocolate and orange sorbet, burnt sugar and salt and elderflower sorbet.

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And on the second day of trading queues were out the door on Sunday - the hottest day of the year so far - just a matter of minutes after opening.

“It’s great, it’s everything I wanted it to be,” said Jack. “We didn’t announce we had opened on Saturday, there had been nothing on social media, no PR. It was really busy. People were starting to notice, they started telling other people, it just exploded.

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"We announced it on Sunday morning on Twitter. We opened the door at 12pm, by two minutes past there was a queue out the door, it continued until 6.30pm in the evening. It was constant, it was great.”

(Image: David Johnson)

Jack said he had been looking for a permanent home for his business since launching it five years ago after going from a life of making ice cream in restaurants and home kitchens as a chef to doing it on his own.

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“There are not many opportunities that arise in Cambridge when it comes to retail,” he said. “In a way it’s really good it happened now. If it happened five years ago I was still learning a lot. It’s nice it happened organically.

(Image: David Johnson)

"We’ve got the best equipment in the world without question. We use absolutely first-class ingredients, we have quite a lot of skills and experience behind us.

“So many of our regulars have been in, they are just over the moon.”

(Image: David Johnson)

Jack’s Gelato is open daily from noon to 9pm.

“In Italy, it’s a real cultural thing to go out in the evening, have a scoop [of ice-cream] and stroll the streets and take in the evening,” Jack added.